FREDERICKTOWN — A Facebook site devoted to a small village in western Washington County is helping past and present residents there reconnect.

Facebook page: Growing Up in The Burg

A vintage photo of an overview of the Fredericktown community, posted on a new Facebook page devoted to those who grew up there. “Growing up in The Burg” has attracted several followers of past and present residents who often share memories and photos of their community.

Since its January launch, the page — “Growing up in the Burg” — has attracted nearly 500 followers who often share photos and memories of the Fredericktown community — dubbed simply “The Burg” by most locals.

The sparsely populated community, just off U.S. 150 near the Nelson County line, was initially established as Fredericksburg in 1818. It changed its name to Fredericktown about 10 years later when the first post office opened there. The name change was reportedly necessary to avoid confusion after postal officials recognized a similarly named town in Gallatin County in northern Kentucky. That town was later renamed Warsaw.

The Fredericktown post office closed in 1911 and today the community is largely anchored by its community park and a landmark steel bridge that crosses the Beech Fork River.

Followers of the Fredericktown page are uniting on the popular Internet site, sharing old photos of baseball teams, school cafeteria workers and popular childhood play sites.

A photo of a local site, Sheep Cave, prompted dozens of comments and “likes” from followers who remember the small cavernous rock formation.

Jill Jane Jones said that she’d once found a stray dog there.

“My cousin took it home and named it Bingo,” she posted on the site.

Jerome Strange said the photo of Sheep Cave is an example of what The Burg used to be.

“Any place outside your home was a giant playground,” he posted.

Some question how the geological formation got its name — a query that could likely be answered as the page gains followers.

The site has become a one-stop resource for those wishing to identify or reconnect with former Fredericktown residents, said its 72-year-old creator Ann Mudd.

With help from her sister, she’s been posting and updating the site regularly. Followers have since added more than 100 photos to the site.

“A lot of us had the pictures, but we didn’t have any resources to display them,” Mudd said. “We all have albums, but when you die people throw them away. I posted some photos and there were so many comments. People have said, ‘This is like a soap opera. I can’t wait until you put the next photos on.’”